[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.She works in the salesdepartment of a Newark area hotel, but with Judee Beyer, the vice-president of CAUSE, the charity that assists United Airlines flight at-tendants in distress, she gives as much time as she can to charityfundraisers for her former colleagues.Also at Newark, the last time I saw Sue, she was dealing withsnow. We had it all planned, she said to a large group at a post snow Murphy.front-214 6/19/06 8:04 AM Page 212| 212 | why we flystorm meeting in February, 2006. But the snow didn t cooperate.In-stead of coming down at the rate of an inch an hour as forecast, itcame down at four inches an hour.For the first time in two years wehad to close the airport, but we ll be ready next time.We don t wantto have to close the airport again, no matter how much MotherNature throws at us. She remains undaunted as ever by the gardenvariety emergencies.Bernie Schettino retired from the Port Authority in February,2006, after thirty-one years, though he continues to call his friendsat work.At his retirement party they showed a video of Bernie insweats running around like Rocky up sand piles used for snow-storms, through the terminals and (as the Rocky theme played) upthe steps at the Administration building.There he turned for his closeup with a sign that read, I went the distance. Asked what he learned most from 9/11, Bernie, who created theFamily Assistance Center for Port Authority victims families, quotedGandhi. The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in serviceto others. Tom Innace, the Port Authority police officer is still on the job andnow also runs marathons to keep moving forward. Other membersof the Port Authority administrative team have moved up to new jobs.Gary Davis is head of operations, Huntleigh Lawrence is the chief oflandside operations and Trevor Liddle works with the airport redevel-opment team.Frank Loprano is still the chief of airside operations, re-porting to John Jacoby, the airport s deputy general manager.John had an interesting observation on what he s learned since9/11. At this airport, we ve always had a sense that team is important, he said. That comes from Sue, but since 9/11 we feel that morestrongly, and I think we act on it consciously.We keep an eye out tosee how people are responding emotionally.That s the role of a man-ager, and Sue promotes it, to monitor the organization s people andget them help if they need it. Murphy.front-214 6/19/06 8:04 AM Page 213epilogue | 213 |He told of a friend, a colleague he had met through his PeaceCorps contacts in the 1970s, when he had worked in the mountainsof southeast Asia. My friend was supposed to leave Sri Lanka onChristmas Day in 2004, but his plane was delayed, John said. As aresult he was there when the tsunami hit.He saw first-hand the de-struction, and since that time has dedicated himself to studyingtrauma, including the effects of post-traumatic stress on people. In the third world, traditionally, they don t give a lot of atten-tion to the After, but I think there s a lesson for us here in the UnitedStates.Nine-eleven didn t just happen to people in New York, Boston,and Washington.It happened to all Americans, and the effects aremore far reaching than I think people are ready to admit.We need topay more attention to the under the radar effects of trauma, whichcan manifest in various negative ways, and linger long after an event.In a very real sense, the time long after a disaster is as critical as thetime immediately after it. John s comments struck a chord with me, because that s the di-rection I found myself heading also.I stopped Sue after her snowmeeting to ask her for a final word on the lessons we might take fromthe tragedy of 9/11 how would she suggest we learn to live withhope in an era of ever-present anxiety?I caught her on the run, of course, but she pointed toward heroffice and the round table where she offered me a few minutes beforethe calls started pouring in that would dictate the direction of her day. We must move forward, she said. Life calls us forward.Wecannot go back to what was.What was is past, and there is only thefuture to focus on.When the old is gone it is gone, and we must moveforward toward new life. She was right, as was John, and so in my new life, I decided Iwould focus on creating three things.First, the reclaimingthesky.com website to give aviation em-ployees an opportunity to share emotions around 9/11 and tell howthey are recovering, as well as provide them with an opportunity to Murphy.front-214 6/19/06 8:04 AM Page 214| 214 | why we flygain support to meet the challenges of keeping America flying dur-ing a turbulent time.That website is up and running, and recentlyivillage.com contributed the software for a Message Board that willgive visitors to the site an expanded opportunity to open discussionsand give and get support.Secondly, there is the issue of the under the radar suffering, asJohn called it, that is still going on with people s unresolved issuesaround 9/11.I aw evidence of that on my journey, and as such Ithink there s an opportunity to reach out to a major research univer-sity to get the school involved with the Reclaiming the Sky Institute,the non-profit a group of us has created.The goal would be to explorethe needs of aviation workers, and suggest mind/body solutions wecan pass back out to the aviation industry through its various nationalassociations.An ambitious task, and it will take reaching out for corporate,government and private support to achieve that.Finally, there s the issue of young people.I would like to see thestories of the brave aviation people in these pages become a base forteaching high school students about empathy. We will create a cur-riculum to take the next step to teach them how to apply that empa-thy to their writing, to teach them how to enhance their writing skills.Another big job, and another go round to search for the supportto achieve it.But, ah, that s the beauty of the full circle: this teachergets to be a teacher again.Now as Janet Ott says and Sue affirms: what new life would youtry if you knew you couldn t fail?
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
